Page 3 of Fake Engagement Arrangement (Wilde Billionaire Brothers #1)

Mollie was trying to control her reaction to Jago’s outrageous offer.

He was willing to pay her a jaw dropping amount of money to pretend she was still his fiancée for his grandmother’s sake.

How could she accept? She mentally pictured the paltry balance in her bank account.

How could she not accept? Did she even have a choice?

It didn’t appear so by the steely light of determination in Jago’s eyes as he watched her like a hawk about to swoop down to collect its much-prized prey.

Besides, there was Eliot to consider.

There was always her brother to consider.

His issues had consumed her life to the point that she wondered if she would ever be free of the burden of worry she carried around like a backpack of boulders.

Eliot needed long-term rehabilitation and therapy, but those things did not come cheaply.

She had already spent every penny Maxwell Wilde had given her on getting help for her brother.

Help that had failed time and time again, because no sooner would Eliot be clean for a day or even a week or two, his demons from the past would come back to haunt him like cruel, taunting ghosts.

Mollie let go of her purse and picked up her waterglass for something to do with her hands.

The cold glass with its cubes of ice bobbing inside it reminded her of the ice around Jago’s heart.

He hated her. She could see it reflected back at her in those impossibly blue eyes.

It pained her to see how much he loathed her when once he’d looked at her with eyes gleaming with passion and respect.

Who in her life had ever looked at her that way?

No one.

Mollie hadn’t told him anything of her background, and she wondered now if that had been a mistake on her part.

But she had spent her life trying to forget about the chaos of her childhood.

She had made up a new version so she didn’t have to suffer the retelling of a terrible tale of neglect and abuse and deadly violence.

She hadn’t even told Jago she had a younger half-brother.

It was easier to edit Eliot out of her backstory so she didn’t have to explain the tragic circumstances that had made Eliot such a train wreck.

Circumstances she should have protected him from but had failed to do so.

That was another burden she carried through life: the guilt of not protecting her younger brother from a vile predator.

Mollie took a sip of water to relieve the dryness of her mouth then put the glass back down.

She straightened in her seat, forcing herself to meet Jago’s gaze.

‘What’s your grandfather going to say when I suddenly appear by your side?

’ The thought of facing Maxwell Wilde was almost as daunting as seeing Jago again.

Would Maxwell sue her for breach of contract?

He was a powerful man with contacts and connections in the upper echelons of society.

‘He won’t be happy about it, but he’s not the one I’m concerned about right now. Gran is my focus.’

Mollie knew Jago and his brothers Jonas and Jack had never been close to their overbearing grandfather, but they each adored their gentle grandmother, Elsie.

Orphaned when young children, they had been raised by their grandparents.

Jago had always been reluctant to talk about his childhood, she assumed because of the grief of losing his parents when he was only five years old, which had made it easier for her not to talk about hers.

His grandmother had always been lovely towards Mollie on the handful of occasions she had seen her, and she had often thought of her in the two years that had passed.

But Mollie had never warmed to Maxwell Wilde because she had met his type so many times before.

A wonderful friend but a dangerous enemy.

Charming on the surface but manipulative and conniving if you fell out of favour with him.

Which unfortunately Mollie had by not being considered good enough for his middle grandson.

Maxwell had done a background check on her and uncovered some of the dark secrets she had so desperately tried to keep hidden.

Eliot’s time in youth detention; her run-in with the police as a teenager when she stole a jacket from a store because she was cold and didn’t have the money to buy one.

But there was one new dark mark against Mollie’s name which she only found out via Maxwell Wilde the day before her wedding to Jago.

While doing research on her, Maxwell had discovered an extortion plot and presented her with a solution to her dilemma.

Suddenly finding herself the victim of an AI sextortion turned her world upside down and inside out.

The horror and shock of seeing those explicit images of her about to be uploaded to a popular porn site had made her sick to her stomach.

The panic. The dread. The drumbeat of fear that if her brother saw those ghastly images, it would send him into another downward spiral, from which he might not recover.

There hadn’t been time to even talk to Jago about it because he had flown to New York for a meeting and couldn’t be contacted.

She thought of how those sickening images might destroy his reputation as well as hers, which was why when Maxwell Wilde swooped in and assured her he could make it all go away by paying off the extortionist, she had agreed to his terms.

Those terrible, heartbreaking but totally necessary terms.

How could she face Maxwell now? Those terms had demanded she disappear from Jago’s life and never return.

Mollie didn’t know if or what Maxwell had told Jago about her and her brother’s history.

She didn’t know if Jago knew about the sextortion that had come close to destroying her life and, by association, perhaps his.

But hadn’t it already destroyed her life?

Her hopes and dreams for a better life—a life where she didn’t have to worry about her brother or try and scrape enough money together to help him—had been part of why she’d wanted to marry Jago.

She had loved him, yes, although she had never heard him say those words back to her.

It hadn’t mattered to her back then. She hadn’t allowed it to matter.

She had only whispered those words once to him while he was sleeping.

She had loved him and wanted to be his wife and pretend her old life belonged to someone else.

But of course, her past came back to haunt her, and it was particularly humiliating that it was Jago’s grandfather who had uncovered her secrets and lies.

‘I heard your grandfather had a stroke a year ago,’ Mollie said to fill the silence.

‘Is he doing okay?’ Mollie wasn’t a vengeful person, but she couldn’t help feeling there had been a bit of karma at play when she read the news report of Maxwell Wilde’s stroke.

He’d survived it but was now confined to a wheelchair and was working doggedly at his rehabilitation.

Whether it had been a success or not hadn’t thus far been reported.

Jago picked up his whisky glass and twirled the amber contents for a moment, his expression inscrutable.

‘He’s found the limitations thrust upon him hard to accept, and he’s made my grandmother’s life difficult as a result.

’ He put the glass down again and uncrossed his ankle, his eyes hard as they held hers. ‘So will you agree to my offer?’

Mollie rolled her lips together, trying her best to resist the outrageous sum he was offering for a weekend of playing pretend.

This was her chance, quite possibly her only chance, of getting Eliot the help he needed.

The drugs he was hooked on had done so much damage to him, but there was a possibility that he could recover with long-term rehab and psychotherapy.

What other way was open to her to raise that amount of money?

Winning the lottery, but what were the chances of that?

Wouldn’t it be better to accept Jago’s offer, for his grandmother’s sake as well as Mollie’s brother’s?

‘How long do you want me for?’ As soon as Mollie uttered the words, she wished she had chosen different ones. She could feel betraying warmth stealing into her cheeks and reached for her glass of water to take a sip, lowering her gaze from the steely glint of his.

‘That depends.’

She glanced at him again, her hand tightening around her drink. The cold from the glass was seeping through her skin into her body. In spite of the flickering warmth of the fireplace nearby, she shivered. ‘On what?’

‘My grandmother is quite unwell. The doctors aren’t willing to give us any certainty on whether or not she will recover her memory. But we will start with her birthday party weekend and see how it goes from there.’